The Monkees in Paris

Sad to hear of the death of Davy Jones, one of the Monkees. Despite being a "manufactured" group created for a TV series, they created some great music over the years and had a huge influence.

Their recordings helped define an era and remain classic songs, the TV series endeared them to an audience that went far beyond their initial viewers in the late 60s and live recordings of the band showed them to be a competent and energetic act that would inspire garage rock bands around the world as much as either the Beatles of The Stones.

The Monkees TV show only features one episode filmed on location outside th USA, The Monkees in Paris. The band were not well known in France at the time as the show that made them stars in the US and UK was not shown in France.

The plot sees the band take a holiday to France to get new ideas for the show. The Monkees TV show, for all its apparent 60s stylings, including references to the TV show they were on, directly addressing the audience, inventive editing, owed much to techniques that had been pioneered in preceding years by French cinema.

The episode featured many chase scenes through the streets of Paris as the band are pursued by girls and fans. There's not much other than this to the plot, but some great scenes of Paris in the late 60s. There are certainly some very bewildered passers by at the Les Halles market.

Filmed in June 1967, it was one of the later episodes of the show, before their full length film Head, regarded by many as a classic of its era.

France was chosen as a location ironically because it would have been difficult to film in the UK on account of their popularity at the time, and they actually could have been pursued by fans for real.



However, the French connection with the Monkees continued with the track The French Song, a tribute to French chanson by the band, recorded on their 1969 album The Monkees Present with Davy Jones on vocals.

It was their eighth album, and came out when the band were a three piece following the departure of Peter Tork. The best known song on the album was the song Listen to the Band

It would be their last album with Mike Nesmith, and following this release the band would continue as a due of Jones and Micky Dolenz for one last album before their 80s reunion.

For their apparent artificiality, the Monkees somehow captured a less cynical, innocent and fun era of music.